Fox News reports that the Japanese will soon go extinct if they do not start making more babies soon, warning that this might be of consequence even to Americans and blaming the usual suspects of herbivorous men, otaku virgins and weird Japanese who prefer making friends “with robots.”

Fox’s article is as insightful as might be expected from America’s premier news source (although it is broadly factually accurate – many of the reports cited will already be familiar to Sankaku complex readers):

Japan has a problem, a lack of children, and it seems likely there will be even fewer in the future.

Japanese researchers have now warned of a doomsday scenario if it carries on this way with the last child to be born there in 3011 and the Japanese people potentially disappearing a few generations later.

Academics from the city of Sendai, which was hit hard by last year’s tsunami, calculate there are now 16.6 million children under the age of 14 now in Japan.

And they say that number is shrinking at a disturbing rate of one every 100 seconds.

So if you do the mathematics, as they did, then the country will have no children within a millennium.

Another study recently showed Japan’s population is expected to fall a third from its current 127.7 million over the next century.

Government projections show the birth rate will hit just 1.35 children per woman within 50 years, well below the replacement rate.

[…]

The question everybody asks is why is there a lack of children?

The answer seems to lie in several reasons.

One reason is the cost. Japan is an extremely expensive country and getting a child through college can wipe out a family’s finances.

But research shows it goes much deeper than that as the Japanese state does throw a lot of money at people with children.

Another argument is that there are more effeminate men now called “Herbivores” there who are either not interested in sex or women don’t find masculine enough.

Then some suggest many young Japanese people prefer “virtual” friends with a robot or on the internet, while others suggest their fascination with comics rather than relationships is the cause for a lack of babies.

A study was released earlier this year in which it showed Japan’s young people are shunning the idea of marriage and having children.

The National Institute of Population and Social Security Research study also showed one in four unmarried men and women in their 30s had never had sex, and most young women preferred being single.

It also showed over 60 percent of unmarried young men didn’t have a girlfriend, and nearly 50 percent of women of the same age weren’t dating.

If that wasn’t bad enough, young Japanese people are also, it seems, increasingly not interested in sex.

A survey by the Japan Family Planning Association found that 36 percent of males between 16 and 19 had “no interest” in sex.

Japan’s falling birth rate could seem to be an interesting fact but of little consequence to a country like the United States, yet it could have a huge impact on how Japan interacts with the outside world in the future, even affecting how it supports international obligations and alliances.

“Japan will be more likely to prioritize healthcare than international security,” Brad Glosserman and Tomoko Tsunada wrote in Foreign Policy Magazine. “Older societies are typically more risk-averse, and Japanese — ‘reluctant realists’ at the best of times — will be increasingly unwilling to put their most precious resource, their young, in harm’s way,” they said.

Japan’s population isn’t falling faster because people there are living longer.

Japan has a life expectancy of about 86 years for women and 79 for men at present, and the ages are expected to rise in the coming decades.

More than 20 percent of Japan’s people are aged 65 or over, one of the highest proportions of elderly in the world.

Japan’s graying population is a real problem for the country’s leaders as they need to ensure the dwindling numbers of workers can pay for all the care needed for the growing army of pensioners.

It should come as no surprise that the Japanese response to all this research has been one of sublime indifference…

Yeah sure, Hitler was right, just like every politician in history. Thank you fellow politicians for our great economies and education systems. What would we do without you and your bright minds and all your knowledge in sociology, psychology and everything in between, I mean, who needs scientific proof of anything when you all know it all.

Ok i read this so it was influence of the west:
Porn was first seriously restricted in Japan in the Meiji Era, when materials deemed “injurious to public morals” were banned [thanks to the introduction of Victorian morals from the West]. After Japan’s defeat in WW2, American occupation authorities changed many of Japan’s laws to guarantee freedom of speech and expression. Sadly, the occupation authorities decided that the pre-existing law regarding pornography didn’t need to be changed. It has remained in effect to this day.

Actually I first read about it in "The Diary of Anne Frank", but there are also some Hentai and even normal TV-Shows that covered the issue. Now I'm pretty sure woman can't see their own genitals without the aid of a mirror. That or its a conspiracy. A female conspiracy no less.

Exactly, if they are censoring vaginas how are their people going to know where in the vagina are they supposed to stick it? Most otaku don't even know what a vagina really looks like because all they've been seeing are mosiacs.

I live in Japan. There are a hell of a lot of reasons why the birthrate is so low. The main culprits are shitty salaries, long work hours, and small apartments (high rent). Good luck finding or having time for a girlfriend when the vast majority of your time is spent working. Making kids is just unrealistic for the working man, unless you live in the bumpkins or something. Oh, and I haven't even addressed the social clusterfuck that is Japanese dating culture.

Fortunately the problem is self-correcting. The people who are too hung up on tradition will be bred out by the people who aren't.

It'd be a fantastic time to hit the lottery, buy a mansion in Japan, and father a dozen kids or so. A hundred years from now your family could have been the starting point of a large population segment. d=

It's influencing over western countries as well. This isn't due to what you mentioned at all. Social Media would be the main suspect you don't even have to leave the house to converse with your friends as well as computers making everything accessible which was once thought impossible.

Look at the state now, 50 inch LED TVS are cheap, internet doesn't cost much, streaming of movies from internet sources hell there isn't much reason to go to the movies any more!!

Even without these things lets say doesn't exist would you sit home just watching TV? Hell no you would do something else like go to the movies, east out, etc.

That is just some of the factors that shows why Japan has such low birth rate. There was an interesting discussion I had with some friends. The fact is that higher education correlates with low birth rates. There has been studies showing that highly educated people would find other sources of entertainment other than sex. Beside not having the time, Japan's education standard practically too high and teaches their youth to find other sorts of entertainment beside sex.

The situation is too complex to explain in complete accuracy, but I will do my best.

Essentially, Japan does not have its own dating culture. The current ideas of dating, marriage, and family life were entirely borrowed from the west during the last hundred years or so. As such, there seems to be a lack of free thought in regards to personal human relationships. Everything has to follow a prescribed pattern to a certain extent. Furthermore, people don't discuss social issues and personal relationships to the depth you might expect in other countries. There's the whole tatemae/honne thing and keeping stuff to extremely closed in-groups...

A lack of free communication combined with the fact that Japanese people, and especially girls, tend to be extremely shy, means that the guys have to basically do all the work, and you never really know what the other person thinks until you've lived with them for several years, if ever.

Many girls are gold-diggers, although that's not too much different from other countries. However, there seems to be a barren desert of shallowness as well as lack of critical thinking that plagues the country to some extent. I dunno if this is different from the west, but I find it extremely difficult to find anyone who actually thinks about things critically rather than just accepting them like a robot. Considering that many girls don't even talk about their personal opinions about anything, they can have some pretty bizarre ideas about everything because it's all the most shallow aspects taken from society and tv.

Well, I don't think I gave a very good explanation, but I think I touched on a few good points.

Anon above makes some good points. I also live in Japan and would add:

- Japanese people do not date one on one much. Most people have dating parties (gokon) to find a girlfriend.

- The whole X-mas cake thing (over 25 = not wanted) has some truth to it. My Japanese guy friends feel there is something wrong with a single girl over 25. Also a lot of guys can be overly picky here.

- The women here are materialistic and shallow. They'd rather deal with a guy with a good job they don't like than a guy they like who has a bad job/career. My friend worked at McDs and then got a job with Sony same girls who rejected him were now interested in him.

- Women here are just not as interested in sex when compared to other countries. Also more than a few are cold dead fish in bed and see sex as a chore to do for the boyfriend/husband just like doing the dishes.

- I've had women refuse sex when I am at their place due to the neighbors hearing them and are self conscious about it. Hence the need for Love Hotels.

- Add in hostess clubs, girls bars, soaplands and escorts and cheap airfare to Thailand and the men have ways of getting their needs met.

The difference is that "Japan" doesn't give a flying fuck about rural or country. All of their efforts are concentrated on the megalopolises. The situation is now worse than ever because so many people from the north/north-east want to abandon their homes but can't because they can't afford it.

I got a chance to trek around the countryside quite often and the general consensus is that people would rather move out of the country yesterday rather than tomorrow.

Rural living. The Japanese themselves only "get by" outside of big cities. What chances would foreigners have? Draw a nice picture from there.

How come people from Hong Kong don't have the same problems with the given arguments? It's just the mentality, I tell you. And people need to stop criticizing stuff that are contra anime. I hate to admit it, but don't tell me it's not true that people tend to be more asocial if they stay home and watch anime all day.

Even you guys say stuff like 2D > 3DPD, don't say otherwise when people confront you with it, and put your dear hobby in a bad light.